The Senate voted overwhelmingly on Wednesday to override President Obama’s veto of a bill that would allow the families of 9/11 victims to sue Saudi Arabia.

The 97-1 vote marks the first time the Senate has mustered enough support to overrule Obama’s veto pen.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) was the sole vote to sustain Obama’s veto. Not a single Democrat to the Senate floor before the vote to argue in favor of Obama’s position.

The House is expected to vote to override Obama’s veto later on Wednesday.

The White House lashed out at the Senate vote, calling it “embarrassing.”

“I would venture to say that this is the single most embarrassing thing that the United States Senate has done, possibly, since 1983,” Obama spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters aboard Air Force One.

The White House had little chance in preventing the override after Obama used his veto pen on Friday.

The legislation, sponsored by Senate Republican Whip John Cornyn (Texas) and Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), would create an exception in the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act allowing the victims of terrorism to sue foreign sponsors of attacks on U.S. soil.

It was crafted primarily at the urging of the families of victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks who want to sue Saudi Arabian officials if they are found to have links to the hijackers who flew planes into the World Trade Center and Pentagon.

It passed the Senate and House unanimously in May and September, respectively, but without roll-call votes.

The overwhelming support, the backing of the September 11 families and the election season all contributed to the president’s loss.

Obama warned in a veto message to the Senate last week that the bill would improperly give legal plaintiffs and the courts authority over complex and sensitive questions of state-sponsored terrorism.

He also cautioned that it would undermine protections for U.S. military, intelligence and foreign service personnel serving overseas, as well as possibly subject U.S. government assets to seizure.

Obama sent a letter to Senate leaders reiterating his concerns.

“The consequences of JASTA could be devastating to the Department of Defense and its service members — and there is no doubt that the consequences could be equally significant for our foreign affairs and intelligence communities,” he wrote in the letter, which was later circulated by a public affairs company working for the embassy of Saudi Arabia.

Cornyn argued that Obama has mischaracterized the bill.

“He cites concerns that the bill would ‘create complications,’ he says, with some of our close partners, but the truth is JASTA only targets foreign governments who sponsor terrorist attacks on American soil, plain and simple,” he said.

The Saudi Embassy and a high-priced team of lobbyists it hired waged an intense campaign to persuade lawmakers to sustain the override, but it came too late.

General Electric, Dow Chemical, Boeing and Chevron are among the corporate titans that have weighed in against the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act, or JASTA…

the Saudis will seek a new bill to scale back the law in the lame-duck session or in the next session, after lawmakers are relieved from the heat of the campaign, people familiar with the plans said.

“It’s Washington at its finest,” one of the people said.

The Saudis are now spending more than $250,000 a month fighting the bill, retaining powerhouses Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, Glover Park Group, Sphere Consulting and Squire Patton Boggs. Besides working with companies invested in Saudi Arabia, the lobbyists are directly contacting lawmakers, placing opinion articles and seeking support from think tank scholars.

GOP Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Bob Corker of Tennessee are trying to hammer out a compromisethat would soften the bill, bringing it in line with previously proposed versions rather than keeping the harsher language that just passed.

A proposed amendment obtained by POLITICO — an effort that one person said was led primarily by Graham — suggests restoring an exemption for discretionary government actions, which the document says would prevent American interference in foreign countries’ internal policies and vice versa. A Graham spokesman declined to comment on the language.

Graham, who had voiced concerns about the legislation, said in an interview last week that discussions to address those issues were “not at the level I would appreciate.”

President Obama on Friday vetoed legislation that would allow families of 9/11 victims to sue Saudi Arabia in U.S courts, setting up a high-stakes showdown with Congress.

“I recognize that there is nothing that could ever erase the grief the 9/11 families have endured,” Obama wrote in his veto message. “Enacting JASTA into law, however would neither protect Americans from terrorist attacks nor improve the effectiveness of our response to such attacks.”

Obama’s move opens up the possibility that lawmakers could override his veto for the first time with a two-thirds vote in both chambers.

Republican and Democratic leaders have said they are committed to holding an override vote, and the bill’s drafters say they have the support to force the bill to become law.

The Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (JASTA) unanimously passed through both chambers by voice vote.

But the timing of the president’s veto is designed to erode congressional support for the bill and put off a politically damaging override vote until after the November elections.

Obama waited until the very end of the 10-day period he had to issue a veto, hoping to buy time to lobby members of Congress against the measure.

White House officials also hope congressional leaders will leave Washington to hit the campaign trail before trying for an override, kicking a vote to the lame-duck session after the election.

But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has said the upper chamber will remain in session until the veto override vote is done.

“Now that we have received the veto message from the president, the Senate will consider it as soon as practicable in this work period,” said David Popp, a McConnell spokesman.

Under current law, 9/11 victims’ families may sue a country designated as a state sponsor of terrorism, such as Iran. JASTA would allow U.S. citizens to sue countries without that designation, including Saudi Arabia.

The measure has touched a political nerve ahead of an election in which terrorism has emerged as a central issue. It has strong bipartisan support and is backed by 9/11 families’ organizations.

Those families have sought damages from Saudi Arabia, since 15 of the 19 hijackers on Sept. 11, 2001 hailed from that country.

Critics have long been accused the Saudi government of directly or indirectly supporting the attacks, though a concrete link has never been proven.

In a statement, the 9/11 Families & Survivors United for Justice Against Terrorism said they are “outraged and dismayed” by the veto and call his reasoning “unconvincing and unsupportable.”

Around the world, but particularly in the USA, there are sizeable quantities of people who believe that the full story of the events of September 11, 2001, has yet to be told.

Their views range from suggesting that the Twin Towers were made to collapse by a concealed bomb to arguing that a debt-ridden, failing US government fabricated the whole thing as an excuse for a war.

In amongst them are other people more quietly asking if it was feasible that the 19 plotters didn’t have help from people inside and outside the USA, and asking why, to date, the US government won’t answer all their questions.

Why, for example, did so many of the plotters have links to a small, unremarkable Florida town?

In the years before 9/11 the intelligence community had been fearing that Al Qaeda would carry out a major high-profile attack – the director of the CIA even famously commented, ‘The system was blinking red.’ Mark Rossini had been seconded from the from the FBI, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, to work for Alec Station – a unit of the CIA, the Central Intelligence Agency, gathering foreign intelligence on Al Qaeda.

In December 1999 he and a FBI colleague learned that two Saudis, both known Al Qaeda members, Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid al-Mihdhar, travelled to Malaysia to plan further attacks and had US visas in their passports. But Mark says that his CIA bosses wanted to keep the information to themselves. He says: “It’s not for the FBI to know. I said, ‘What do you mean, it’s not for the FBI to know? [And I was told] ‘When and if we want the FBI to know, we will let them know, but you’re not to say anything.’ So, I’m stopped in my tracks.”

Thomas Drake worked as a senior analyst for the National Security Agency, the organisation that monitors communications and intelligence. He recalls discovering that whilst Mihdhar and Al-Hamzi lived in San Diego their phone calls to Al-Qaeda HQ in Yemen had been recorded, but that key intelligence about them – including that the calls came from San Diego – was not analysed and shared with other agencies. He says: “You can imagine my horror finding out critical intelligence inside NSA databases that was undiscovered.”

Two months before 9/11 the CIA admitted they had lost the pair and asked the FBI for help, but by then it was too late. Many relatives of those who died on 9/11 still don’t believe they’ve been told the full story. Kathy Owens lost her husband, Pete, in the Twin Towers, and says: “Isn’t the main job of the government to keep their people safe? I at least expected them to stick up for us, and stand up for us, and get to the bottom of everyone who was responsible and tried to stop it from happening again.”

The US Government says the 9/11 Commission provided a definitive statement about the nature of Al Qaeda support that came from Saudi Arabia and did not determine that the Saudi government had intended to support it, but Senator Bob Graham says he has questions about whether close ties between the United States and Saudi Arabia have meant the real story has been buried.

Sep. 9, 2016 – Two days prior to the 15th anniversary of the Muslim attack on the World Trade Center Towers, Sacramento radio AM 1530 KFBK was heard proselytizing for the Muslim religion.

Note that this was not a Public Service Announcement or paid advertisement; it was within a news report about the 9/11 anniversary. During the 9:00 am news broadcast this morning, news anchor Kitty O’Neil said, paraphrased:

” This Sunday, Sep. 11 marks the 15th anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center that killed Americans. The next, Monday, Sep. 12, is a Muslim holiday and Muslims are concerned about a backlash because it is so close to 9/11. ”

A representative from CAIR is introduced. He explained the holiday. I do not think he named it; it’s the Eid al-Adha, the Feast of Sacrifice.

The news story ends with, “CAIR hopes you will reach out to Muslims to learn about this holiday.”

Have you ever heard a non-Catholic news report say, “The Catholic bishops hope you will reach out to Catholics to learn about Lent” ?! (We could have benefited from being propped up like that in 2002, the Year of the Priest Crisis.)

We wonder if Catholic religious celebrations will ever be endorsed during a non-Muslim radio news report in the same manner! They are nonviolent and peaceful.

The only animal sacrificed by Catholics is the Chocolate Easter Bunny, and it may be “halal” – sharia-approved – if bought outside the U.S.

On September 11, 2001 Huma Abedin — Hillary Clinton’s aide for twenty years and co-chair of her current Presidential run — was working for an organization located in the offices of Saudi Arabia’s Muslim World League.

That’s a Wahhabist Islamic group that Breitbart News recently reported was going to be put on a list of terror funders by U.S. government but was removed, reportedly under pressure from Saudi Arabia.

This latest revelation ties the Muslim World League directly to the The Institute for Muslim Minority Affairs and the Journal for Muslim Minority Affairs, an organization that Vanity Fair writer William D. Cohan called “the Abedin family business.

Huma Abedin is scheduled to give a deposition today on her role in the Hillary Clinton email server scandal, which involved classified documents.

Muslim World League London Office & Abedin Family Business Have Same Address

An archived webpage from the Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs from a little over a year after 9/11 — December 2, 2002, the earliest date available — shows that then-New York Senator Hillary Clinton’s aide Huma Abedin was an assistant editor of the Journal.

Aside from Huma herself, also listed on that same date as editors are her sister Heba, her brother Hassan and her mother, Saleha S. Mahmood.

Listed on the Board of Advisers on that date is former Muslim World League Secretary General Abdullah Omar Naseef, who is listed as being on the “Majlis as-Shura.”

Majlis as-Shura or Shura Council, also known as the Consultative Assembly of Saudi Arabia, is a 150 member board of advisers—all appointed by the Saudi Arabian King—that proposes laws to the King and cabinet in the Kingdom’s absolute monarchy.

From that same December 2002 date, another webpage on the Institute for Muslim Minority Affairs site about how to reach the Journal says “Editorial Correspondence including submission of articles and books for review should be addressed to: Editor, Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs 46 Goodge Street, London WIP 1FJ, U.K.”

The current official Journal website also lists the same 46 Goodge Street address, which is the same exact address listed on the Muslim World League’s London office address.

The official website for the Muslim World League’s London office lists its address as 46 Goodge Street.

Although she was working for Senator Hillary Clinton in 2001, at that time Huma Abedin was an unknown but influential aide, so her connection the the Muslim World League went unexamined. Continue reading →

OWEGO, N.Y. – A controversy in Town of Owego over a new monument in Hickories Park for a major terrorist attack in September of 2001. Its wording has upset some. The monument references, ” nineteen Islamic terrorists” as being responsible for 9/11.

A spokesperson for the Islamic Organization of the Southern Tier says that having the words “Islamic terrorists” on the monument is a broad brush against the many Muslims who live in the Southern Tier. The group has asked that the monument say “terrorists” or, if they must, use “al-Qaeda terrorists.”

We asked a town lead if the idea of using the term “Islamic terrorists” was a bad one in the era of political correctness? Town Supervisor Donald Castellucci says it is an accurate historical portrayal.

“I don’t live in a politically correct world,” he said. “I live in a historical fact world and cross-terrorism, whether it’s American, homegrown, Christianity, Islamic, you call it what it is. And, we don’t whitewash things, especially here. And, we think we done the accurate citing of what happened.”

Did the reporter intentionally misquote the Castellucci with “we think we done” to show up widely in print? The video below clearly shows he says “we think we’ve done.” More: Muslims complain about town’s 9/11 memorial

“This is not about religion,” he told me. “It’s about one event on one day that killed more than 3,000 people.”

“I sent them back an email saying I disagreed with their premise 100 percent.”

On Saturday, the citizens of Owego will commemorate the 15th anniversary of that terrible day by dedicating their memorial park – a park that honors a local resident who died in one of the twin towers.

His name was Derek Statkevicus and he worked on the 89th floor of 2 World Trade Center. And his life was taken by an Islamic terrorist.

That’s a fact.

The first of many attempts, many of which are or will be successful, to whitewash 9/11 and rewrite history each year.

…the “28 pages,” the secret document was part of a 2002 congressional investigation of the Sept. 11 attacks and has been classified since the report’s completion. As CNN reports, former Sen. Bob Graham, who chaired the committee that carried out the investigation and has been pushing the White House to release the pages, said Thursday he was “very pleased” that the documents would be released.

“It is going to increase the questioning of the Saudis’ role supporting the hijackers,” Graham told CNN. “I think of this almost as the 28 pages are sort of the cork in the wine bottle. And once it’s out, hopefully the rest of the wine itself will start to pour out.” Graham added, “Would the U.S. government have kept information that was just speculation away from American people for 14 years if somebody didn’t think it was going to make a difference?”

Under pressure from the victims’ families and lawmakers, President Barack Obama said in April his administration would declassify the pages.

Sources told CNN that intelligence and law enforcement agencies and the State Department have all reviewed and approved the release of the pages with “minimal redactions.” But the report Congress put out had multiple inked out sections.

The Saudi government itself has repeated called for the pages to be made public so that it can respond to any allegations, which it has long called unfounded.

“We’ve been saying since 2003 that the pages should be released,” said Nail Al-Jubeir, director of communications for the Saudi Embassy, ahead of Friday’s developments. “They will show everyone that there is no there there.”

While we have yet to read the full document, one section caught our eye – the use of Saudi “charitable organizations” to finance terorrism:

Now it has emerged that Huma [Abedin] served on the Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs’s editorial board from 2002 to 2008. Documents obtained by author Walid Shoebat reveal that Naseef served on the board with Huma from at least December 2002 to December 2003.

Naseef’s sudden departure from the board in December 2003 coincides with the time at which various charities led by Naseef’s Muslim World League were declared illegal terrorism fronts worldwide, including by the U.S. and U.N.

The MWL, founded in Mecca in 1962, bills itself as one of the largest Islamic non-governmental organizations. But according to U.S. government documents and testimony from the charity’s own officials, it is heavily financed by the Saudi government.

The MWL has been accused of terrorist ties, as have its various offshoots, including the International Islamic Relief Organization, or IIRO, and Al Haramain, which was declared by the U.S. and U.N. as a terror financing front.

Indeed, the Treasury Department, in a September 2004 press release, alleged Al Haramain had “direct links” with Osama bin Laden. The group is now banned worldwide by United Nations Security Council Committee 1267.

The MWL in 1988 founded the Al Haramain Islamic Foundation, developing chapters in about 50 countries, including for a time in Oregon until it was designated a terrorist organization.

In the early 1990s, evidence began to grow that the foundation was funding Islamist militants in Somalia and Bosnia, and a 1996 CIA report detailed its Bosnian militant ties.

The U.S. Treasury designated Al Haramain’s offices in Kenya and Tanzania as sponsors of terrorism for their role in planning and funding the 1998 bombings of two American embassies in East Africa. The Comoros Islands office was also designated because it “was used as a staging area and exfiltration route for the perpetrators of the 1998 bombings.”

The New York Times reported in 2003 that Al Haramain had provided funds to the Indonesian terrorist group Jemaah Islamiyah, which was responsible for the 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people. The Indonesia office was later designated a terrorist entity by the Treasury.

In February 2004, the U.S. Treasury Department froze all Al Haramain’s financial assets pending an investigation, leading the Saudi government to disband the charity and fold it into another group, the Saudi National Commission for Relief and Charity Work Abroad.

In September 2004, the U.S. designated Al-Haramain a terrorist organization. In June 2008, the Treasury Department applied the terrorist designation to the entire Al-Haramain organization worldwide

In other words, the US government knew about this terrorist front all the way back in 2001, even as Hillary’s right hand (wo)man was working for an affiliated entity for years later? We hope to find out more after reading the full document shortly, although sadly we are convinced the important sections will be fully redacted.